National Movement drops the bill but still adherent to constitutional guarantees

Tbilisi, DF Watch – President Saakashvili’s United National Movement Party withdraws the draft bill which legally safeguards Georgia’s Western-oriented foreign policy in order ‘not to interrupt’ the process of negotiations between the government and the UNM.

However, the UNM is still adherent to the principle of continuous foreign policy when it comes to constitutional amendment that reduces right of the president to dissolve the government. The UNM proposed to engrave into the Georgia’s constitution its Western-oriented foreign policy in exchange to vote in favor of the amendment proposed by the ruling Georgian Dream coalition that checks powers of the president.

The UNM also demands guarantees of Georgia never enter Russian led Commonwealth of Independent States and never to station Russian troops on its soil, despite the government officials declared that Georgia doesn’t plan to return back to the CSI.

“The information reported in the media is not true. Our foreign policy course is declared and this is the choice of the Georgian people – Euro Atlantic integration,” Deputy Foreign Affairs Minister Davit Zalkaliani commented on rumors of media about Georgia’s possible return to the CSI.

Parliamentary committee on foreign affairs on Monday had to review a bill proposed bySaakashvili’s party, which suggested legislative guarantees that Georgia won’t change its aspirations to enter the EU and NATO. However, Giorgi Baramidze author of the bill from the National Movement told journalists that he would withdraw it.

He said the UNM doesn’t have enough votes to initiate constitution amendments, but they had an opportunity to present draft for legislative amendments.

“We [the UNM] raised the issue of constitutional amendments guaranteeing unchanged foreign policy. Currently negotiation process is in progress,” he told journalists at the parliament on Monday. “So, in order not to interrupt this process I will today withdraw the bill and we hope that by bilateral agreement we will have opportunity to establish those principles in the constitution.”

The reason this and other policy points have become constitutional topics in Georgia, is that the power bloc which lost the election in October last year, the National Movement of President Mikheil Saakashvili, has been accusing the new government of Bidzina Ivanishvili of wanting to halt the country’s approach toward membership in EU and NATO, or what in political language is called Euro-Atlantic integration.